Miryang - hard-sell for KEPCO

Residents of Miryang, who are opposed to transmission towers to be built across their villages, protest in front of a district office on Sept. 11, the day Prime Minister Chung Hong-won visited the area in South Gyeongsang Province. The protesters' placard reads, "Prime Minister! We do not want compensation." / Yonhap

By Kim Da-ye

Korea Electric Power Corp. (KEPCO) plans to resume building power transmission towers in Miryang, South Gyeongsang Province after the Chuseok holidays, but hurdles still await the construction.

The state-owned power provider is persuading residents of the affected areas in Miryang with compensation packages before pushing ahead with its plan. The company claims that 15 out of 30 villages where transmission towers will be built have so far accepted the deal.

"KEPCO reached an agreement with the 15 villages a while ago," an official from the company's special task force for Miryang said in a telephone interview. "We hope to resume construction of transmission towers after Chuseok, but no dates have been set yet."

KEPCO has a strong endorsement from the government. Yoon Sang-jick, the minister of trade, industry and energy, said earlier this month in a meeting with journalists, "The construction in Miryang will resume when a few conditions are met. The government is negotiating with sincerity. When conditions are met after Chuseok, we think KEPCO will make a decision. We will then let the company judge for itself."

The dispute between KEPCO and residents of Miryang is eight years old. Tens of 765-kilovolt transmission towers will be installed across 30 villages in five myeon, a Korean land unit, with some 1,800 households affected. Residents have fiercely opposed the construction, citing health risks and their wish to stay where they have lived for decades. In a series of protests, a 74-year-old man set himself on fire and several elderly men and women tied themselves to excavators, causing the construction to come to a halt.

For KEPCO, time is running out. The third reactor of the Shingori Nuclear Power Plant is expected to be completed by August next year, and test transmission will begin as early as March. KEPCO initially planned to begin operating the reactor in December this year, but the scandal involving the installation of substandard safety parts has delayed the schedule.

To have the construction project move on, a "special compensation negotiation committee" was launched in August. The committee includes 10 Miryang resident representatives, five KEPCO officials, officials from the energy ministry and municipal governments and a local lawmaker.

Noticeable progress was made on Sept. 11 when the committee came to an agreement on three areas. According to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy (MOTIE), the committee has determined the amount of the monetary compensation for property and psychological damages.

KEPCO initially suggested 16.5 billion won of monetary compensation, and it was raised by 2 billion won. The amount will be distributed to the villages that sign an agreement on the construction of the transmission towers. Up to 40 percent of the amount, 7.4 billion won, will be equally divided and distributed to each household, which is expected to receive a little more than 4 million won (about $3,700).

Another agreement is the provision of 7 billion won — more than three times as much as the 2 billion won initially suggested by KEPCO — for building facilities for farmers in Miryang to directly sell their agricultural products. One billion will go to each myeon, and the rest, 2 billion won, will be distributed, depending on the number of households in the myeon.

The other involves the "Solar Power Valley" project. The members of the committee and KEPCO's power generating subsidiaries signed a memorandum of understanding on Sept. 11 for close cooperation on a solar power generation project in Miryang.

On Sept. 11, Prime Minister Chung Hong-won visited Miryang and announced the compensation plans. He met with the negotiation committee, representative of residents, opposing residents, and municipal leaders.

In reality, however, the outlook remains murky. Protests are likely to continue when the construction resumes as the core group of the opposition has not agreed with the compensation package.

When various news outlets announced last Monday that KEPCO had reached an agreement with 15 villages, the opposition against the transmission towers called "Miryang 765kV Transmission Tower Opposing Task Force" immediately issued a statement, saying that the claim wasn't true.

The task force said that residents opposing the transmission towers aren't interested in monetary compensation. "Residents of Miryang did not fight for the last eight years to win more money," its statement said.

Asked to which extent agreements with those villages were made — for example, the portion of households in a village that signed up, the KEPCO official said that such details are confidential.

Furthermore, the bill that would enable the company to compensate affected villages and households hasn't passed the National Assembly yet. The bill was passed in June by the screening subcommittee of the National Assembly Trade, Industry and Energy Committee and is expected to be discussed at the Assembly in September.

While the bill is strongly backed by the government, there remains much concern that the compensation package could set a bad example for other regions.

Kim Je-nam, a lawmaker of the minor opposition Justice Party, said in a statement last Monday that the compensation package may cause conflict in regions with electric power transmission and transformation facilities.

"Gijang and Jeonggwan New Town of Busan are already demanding the same compensation promised to Miryang. How will the government answer them? If residents living near power plants ask for compensation, what is the government going to do?" Kim said.